Homeschool Update, March-June 2024

Group Activities 

Geography/Art 

From The Complete Book of Marvels by Richard Halliburton, Dad read these sections, and the girls watched accompanying videos: 

• Parthenon, Temple of Athena [video]
• Mt. Athos, Country of Men [video]
• Moscow, Heart of Russia [video]
• Santa Sophia, Mother of Churches [video]
• Ephesus, City of Ancient Temples [video] 
• Halicarnassus [video]
• Colossus, Statue of Helios [video]
• Pharos, Towering Lighthouse [video] 
• Pyramids, Huge Man-Made Wonders [video]
• Knossos, Buried Cretan City [video]
• Timbuctoo, Desert City [video]
• Victoria Falls, Sounding Smoke [video]
• Mecca, Sacred Moslem City [video]
• Petra, Enchanted City [video]
• Dead Sea [video]
• Jerusalem, Rock of Abraham [video]
• Baalbek, City of Marvelous Ruins [video]
• Palmyra, Zenobia's Domain [video]

We also used historical and current world maps to locate different countries that came up in our reading in other areas.

Latin 

We finished Getting Started with Latin: Beginning Latin for Homeschoolers and Self-Taught Students of Any Age by William E. Linney. We spent some time reviewing some of the translation exercises by translating from English to Latin, then started Keep Going with Latin. 

Shakespeare

We read a children's version of As You Like It and the girls watched the animated adaptation.  We will soon watch a version of the play as well. 

Read-Alouds

Dad read aloud these historical fiction titles:

• Children of the Fox by Jill Paton Walsh 
• Hostage to Alexander by Mary Evans Andrews 
• The Eagles Have Flown by Joanne Williamson
• Runner for the King by Rowena Bastin Bennett 

I read aloud these titles: 

• A Swarm in May by William Mayne 
• Noodlehead Stories (excerpts) by M.A. Jagendorf
• The Cottage at Bantry Bay by Hilda van Stockum
• The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge 
• Mystery of the Roman Ransom by Henry Winterfeld
• Swallowdale by Arthur Ransome 
• Magic or Not? by Edward Eager 
• The Whale People by Roderick L. Haig-Brown 
• Barefoot Days by Anna Rose Wright 
• Over the Blue Mountain by Conrad Richter 

We listened to these books on audio: 

• James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl 
• The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare
• When Marnie Was There by Joan G. Robinson 

Catechism 

We continued practicing questions and answers in our Catechism books.  

Science 

C. and E. listened to me read aloud The First Book of Trees by Margaret Wiliamson and Here a Plant, There a Plant, Everywhere a Plant, Plant: A Story of Luther Burbank by Robert M. Quackenbush, and they finished science for the year with the Green Planet documentary series.

M. and I finished reading Secrets of the Universe. 

The Van Cleave experiments started getting old, so she wrote up her last few lab reports on demonstrations from ExperimentArchive that were too dangerous to try at home. 

Health

Both M. and C. visited the orthdontist. M. visited the pediatrician and also accompanied A. to several appointments after she broke one arm, and a month later, the other. 

History 

C. read The Year of the Horseless Carriage and Abraham Lincoln's World. 

M. read The Ancient Greek World, The Ancient Roman World, and The Ancient American World and completed related pages in the accompanying workbooks. 

E. continued reading A Child's History of the World by V.M. Hillyer through the Fall of Rome. She started listing to The Story of Civilization Volume 1 for review of this year's history topics. 

All three girls went in period dress on a field trip to a one-room schoolhouse. 

English

In Critical Thinking Co.'s Sentence Diagramming program, M. completed level 1 and level 2. C. finished the beginner level and moved on to level 2.  E. did some adjective worksheets to help her practice. 

M. finished Vocabulary from Classic Roots level 6 and started level B. 

R. finished reading all but the last of the Hooked on Phonics readers. A. started reading consonant-vowel-consonant words.

Math 

M. continued working on Challenging Word Problems 3 and finished Singapore Primary Mathematics 6B. In Life of Fred, she continued with Decimals and Percents and she worked on 7th grade math and Algebra 1 on Khan Academy. She is working on Algebra this summer. 

C. finished Singapore Primary Mathematics 4A and made significant progress in 4B, as well as in fifth grade math on Khan Academy.  

E. finished Singapore Primary Mathematics 1A and started 1B. She finished early math and is worked quickly through 2nd grade math on Khan Academy and is now making significant progress in third grade math. 

Music 

M. and C. continued working on the music theory exercises in Practical Theory by Sandy Felstein. All three girls practiced piano and recorder daily. C. started learning ukulele and M. started guitar. 

Physical Education

Now that pool season is here, our main focus is swimming at the pool. The girls played freeze tag and other group games with friends in the neighborhood. M. and C. learned the basics of baseball from their aunt while watching Mets games on our visit to NY. 

Homeschool Update: November & December 2023

Group Activities

Geography/Art 

From The Complete Book of Marvels by Richard Halliburton, Dad read these sections, and the girls watched accompanying videos: 

• Fort Jefferson, Coral Outpost [video]
• Popocatepetl, Smoking Crater [video]
• Chichen Itza, Mayan Capital [video]
• Christophe's Citadel [video]
• Panama Canal, Mammoth Ditch [video]
• Machu Picchu, Inca Fortress [video]
• Iguazu Falls [video]
• Rio de Janeiro, Glittering City [video]
• Gibraltar, Rocky Sentry [video]

Latin 

We continued our lessons in Getting Started with Latin: Beginning Latin for Homeschoolers and Self-Taught Students of Any Age by William E. Linney. 

Shakespeare 

We read Twelfth Night from Shakespeare Stories by Leon Garfield and watched the animated adaptation.  The girls each memorized a speech from the play. E. had Orsino's "If music be the food of love..." from Act 1 scene 1. C. had Olivia's "O, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful" from Act 3 scene 1, and M. had Malvolio's "Daylight and champaign discovers not more" from Act 2 scene 5. 

Read-Alouds

Dad read aloud these historical fiction titles: 

• "The Winged Cat,"  "The Prince and the Golden Ax," and "The Demon Pazuzu" by Deborah Nourse Lattimore
• The Winged Girl of Knossos by Erick Berry 
• A Song for Gilgamesh by Elizabeth Hodges 
• Mara of Old Babylon by Elizabeth Witheridge 

I read aloud these titles: 

• Mist on the Mountain by Caroline Flory 
• Christmas, edited by Alice Dalgliesh
• The Best Christmas by Lee Kingman 
• The Lion in the Box by Marguerite deAngeli

Catechism

We did our regular lessons from the Catechism books in November, but in December, we focused mainly on Advent. We did the Jesse Tree and our morning Advent prayer service and in the evenings we lit the Advent wreath and prayed using Lisa Hendey's 5 Minute Prayers Around the Advent Wreath. We also attended the Greccio Living Nativity at the Shrine of St. Anthony, carols in the church at our parish, and Mass for the Immaculate Conception and Christmas Eve in addition to the Sundays of Advent. We also read Hanna's Christmas for St. Lucy Day and watched Juan Diego: Messenger of Guadalupe on Formed, as well as the Christmas specials of Story Keepers, Brother Francis, and Benjamin Cello.

Poetry 

In November, we continued reading Poem Making by Myra Cohn Livingston. In December, we read Christmas poems from the Dalgliesh Christmas book in lieu of poetry lessons. 

Science 

C. and E. finished the animal sections of The Golden Treasury of Natural History, but I felt we needed further study. C. started working on the Classic Science student book by Scott McQuerry and E. started Animals: A Science Workbook for Ages 4 to 6. After a couple weeks, we weren't happy with E.'s book so I told her to stop and we started reading The First Book of Birds by Margaret Williamson together. My plan is to continue studying animals separately, then bring the two girls back together in February or March to study plants.

From Secrets of the Universe, M. and I read: The Law of Universal Gravitation, Conservation of Momentum, and Optics - the laws of Light. From Physics for Every Kid by Janice Van Cleave, she did experiments 39 (Balancing Act), 41 (Paper Flop), and 45 (Ramp) and wrote reports.

Health

In December, we had several health-related appointments. C. had a visit to the orthodontist. E. visited the optometrist and ended up with glasses. All 5 kids went to the dentist. 

History 

M. read The Ancient Egyptian World and staretd The Ancient South Asian World. She watched Great Courses lectures from History of Ancient Egypt and History of India as well as episodes of Ancient Lives and Story of India. Independently, she read The Lost Queen of Egypt by Lucile Morrison,  Boy of the Pyramids by Ruth Fosdick Jones. 

With Dad, C. read these sections from The World of Captain John Smith:  Indians and Thanksgiving (1621); Trouble in Bohemia; Of Kings and Brides; Massacres, Indian and White; Hugo Grotius; A Painter Goes to Paris (Rubens); Buckingham Finds a Bride for Charles; Enter Cardinal Richelieu; Broken Promises; La Rochelle and the Huguenots; New France Again; On the Way to China; Inside the Great Wall; Japan's Closing Door (1622); In and Out for Christian IV; John Winthrop of Groton Manor; Neighbors, New Amsterdam and Plymouth; Velazquez; Velazquez Sees Rome; Galileo's Final Visit to Rome; Gustav Adolf (d. 1632); Plans for Massachusetts; John Smith Is Not Invited; Governor Winthrop;  Pilgrims and Puritans; The Bell Tolls (1631)

They also read The Puritan Revolution by C. Walter Hodges, and The World of William Penn by Genevieve Foster, which includes these sections: 

• William Penn, 1660-1684 
• Three French Explorers (Marquette, Joliet, La Salle, 1672, 1682)
• Louis XIV, 1643-1715
• Two Moghul Emperors (Shah Jahan & Aurangzeb Alamgir, 1658-1707)
• Sir Isaac Newton, Edmund Halley
• William Penn, 1684-1699
• James II
• William and Mary, 1688
• K'Ang-Hsi, 1662-1722
• Peter the Great, 1682-1725
• William Penn, 1699-1718

In A Child's History of the World by V.M. Hillyer, E and I read these chapters: 

• Fairy-Tale Gods
• A Fairy-Tale War
• The King of the Jews
• The People Who Made Our ABCs
• Hard as Nails
• The Crown of Leaves
• A Bad Beginning 

We also read Life Long Ago: The Athenians by Leonard Weisgard, Archimedes Takes a Bath by Joan Lexua and The Iliad and The Odyssey by Jane Werner Watson. Independently, she read Lysis Goes to the Play by Caroline Dale Snedeker, The Spartan Twins by Lucy Fitch Perkins, Our Little Athenian Cousin of Long Ago by Julia Darrow Cowles, and Our Little Spartan Cousin of Long Ago by Julia Darrow Cowles. 

English 

M. switched from Rex Barks to the Beginning book of Sentence Diagramming and continued with Vocabulary from Classical Roots A. 

C. continued with the Beginning book of Sentence Diagramming. 

E. switched from Grammarland to Treasures Grammar Practice Book Grade 1 

R. (age 3.5) worked with me in The Ordinary Parents' Guide to Teaching Reading and practiced reading Dad and Sam.  

A. (also 3.5) is slowly working on learning letters.

Math

M. continued working in Challenging Word Problems 3. She finished all the review sections in Singapore Primary Mathematics 5B and 6A and moved on to the final book, 6B. She started Life of Fred: Decimals and Percent and worked on 7th grade math and algebra basics on Khan Academy. 

C. continued with Singapore Primary Mathematics 3B and Life of Fred: Farming. She moved into 4th grade math on Khan Academy. 

E. finished Singapore Primary Mathematics 1A and started 1B. She continued with Early Math on Khan Academy.  

Music

All three girls practiced piano and recorder. They sang carols at church and at the Greccio Living Nativity. 

Physical Education

When the weather is good, the girls have been running on the hill and playing on the playground. Indoors, they have done some exercise and dancing videos.  

Homeschool Update: October 2023

Group Activities

Geography/Art 

From The Complete Book of Marvels by Richard Halliburton, Dad read the sections about the Boulder (Hoover) Dam, Niagara Falls, New York City, and Washington, DC. Then we watched these videos: 

• America's Most Powerful Dam
• Thundering Waters
• New York, the Wonder City
• District of Columbia

Latin 

We continued working our way through Getting Started with Latin: Beginning Latin for Homeschoolers and Self-Taught Students of Any Age by William E. Linney. After we learned a few verbs and how to conjugate them, we took a break from the book to make sure all three girls were solid in their understanding of how to identify and translate each verb. E. took a bit to catch up. C. is our strongest Latin student right now. 

Shakespeare

The girls spent October memorizing some of the three witches' lines from Macbeth. They recorded a performance on Halloween. 

Read-Alouds

In October, Dad read aloud The Golden Goblet by Eloise Jarvis Mcgraw and Egyptian Adventures by Olivia Coolidge. I read aloud A Lemon and a Star by E. C. Spykman and we played the audiobook of The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury. 

Catechism

M. and C. continued to memorize answers to questions in the New St. Joseph Baltimore Catechism Volume 1 and E. continued to memorize the answers to questions in  The St. Joseph First Communion Catechism. 

Poetry

We are reading Poem-making: Ways to Begin Writing Poetry by Myra Cohn Livingston on Fridays. 

Science 

C. and E. read about birds and insects in The Golden Treasury of Natural History. In Secrets of the Universe, M. and I read three chapters: "Planetary Motion," "Pendulums and Falling Objects - Galileo's Laws of Motion," and "Newton's Three Laws of Motion." She watched several demonstrations by Julius Sumner Miller, and did two experiments from Janice VanCleave's Physics for Every Kid, one about buoyancy and one about gravity. 

Health 

E. watched the episodes of How the Body Works about the tongue and the nervous system. M. visited the orthodontist. 

History 

E. and I read about Egypt in A Child's History of the World by V.M. Hillyer. We also read Pharaoh's Boat by David Weitzman and The Great Pyramid by Elizabeth Mann. On her own, she read: 

• Mummies Made in Egypt by Aliki
• Pepi and the Secret Names by Jill Paton Walsh 
• Hatshepsut, His Majesty, Herself by Catherine M. Andronik
• Zekmet, the Stone Carver: A Tale of Ancient Egypt by Mary Stolz
• Seeker of Knowledge by James Rumford 
• The Shipwrecked Sailor: An Egyptian Tale with Hieroglyphs by Tamara Bower
• Sokar and the Crocodile by Alice Howard 

She also acted out an Egyptian burial using a homemade paper mummy and a shoebox sarcophagus she decorated herself using drawing instructions from Ralph Masiello's Ancient Egypt Drawing Book. 

M. and I finished The Early Human World and read most of The Ancient Near Eastern World. She watched most of the episodes of the Great Courses class, Between the Rivers. She wrote a narration about Hammurabi and read The Three Brothers of Ur by J. G. Fyson. 

C. and Dad continued reading The World of Captain John Smith by Genevieve Foster, covering these sections: 

• John Smith, Sightseer in Italy (1600)
• Galileo
• A Royal Wedding (1600 - Henry IV & Maria de Medici)
• Grand Opera and the Violin
• John Smith and the Terrible Turks (1601-1603)
• John Smith, Slave (1603)
• Cervantes and Don Quixote
• Boris Godunov
• The Queen Is Dead (1603)
• King James I
• The Globe Theater
• Ben Jonson
• Sir Walter Raleigh a Prisoner (1603)
• Sir Francis Bacon Rings the Bell
• The King James Bible (1604)
• Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot (1605)
• A Meeting in Scrooby Village
• A Frenchman Reports on New Spain (Champlain)
• Santa Fe, New Mexico
• Champlain Visits Canada
• Off to Virginia (1606)
• New France, the First Colony
• The Great Chief Powhatan
• John Smith at Jamestown (1607)
• A Compass and Talking Paper
• Pocahontas and John Smith
• John Smith Draws a Map of Virginia (1608)
• Half Moon on the Hudson River
• French and Indians on Lake Champlain
• President John Smith (1608)
• Starvation and Shipwreck
• (Tobacco to the Rescue)
• A Synagogue in Amsterdam
• At Home in Leyden
• (The Telescope (1608))
• Galileo and the Planets
• Henry IV is Dead
• Galileo in Rome (1611)
• French Missionaries in Canada
• Pocahontas Is Married
• The Royal Couple
• King Gustav Adolf
• Russia's New Tsar, Michael Romanov (1613)
• The Naming of New England
• In Memory of Shakespeare (d. 1616)
• Pocahontas in England
• The Law vs. the King?
• Raleigh's Last Adventure (1616)
• The House of Burgesses (1619)
• Servants and Slaves (1619)
• They Knew That They Were Pilgrims
• John Smith, Unhappy Admiral
• The Mayflower Sails (1620)
• Anchored at Plymouth

C. also read Puritan Adventure by Lois Lenski. 

English 

M. continued working on Vocabulary from Classical Roots A and Rex Barks. E. continued working in Grammarland. C. continued working in the Beginning book of Sentence Diagramming. 

R. started sounding out consonant-vowel-consonant words. 

Math

M. continued working on Challenging Word Problems 3. She finished the reviews in Singapore 5A and moved on to 5B. She also continued with Khan Academy 6th grade math, Life of Fred: Decimals and Percents and drilling math facts with flashcards online every Friday. 

C. continued with Singapore 3B, Khan Academy 3rd grade math, and Life of Fred: Farming.

E. continued with Singapore 1A and Khan Academy early math. 

Music

All three girls practiced piano and recorder daily. 

Physical Education

The girls rode bikes and played on the playground. They also did an exercise video from the Ten Thousand method once or twice. 

Homeschool Update: September 2023

Group Activities

Geography/Art  

Dad is reading aloud geography this year from The Complete Book of Marvels by Richard Halliburton. This month, he read the sections about the Transbay Bridge, the Golden Gate Bridge, Yosemite, and the Grand Canyon. After each section, the kids all watched a related video. The videos were:  

• Building the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge (1937)
• BUILDING THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE 1960s BETHLEHEM STEEL PROMOTIONAL MOVIE SAN FRANCISCO MD65664
• Let's See Yosemite, 1938
• 1940s SANTA FE RAILROAD GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK PROMOTIONAL FILM 46014

The architectural landmarks covered in this book are our focus for art this year.

Latin 

We completed the first 20 lessons of Getting Started with Latin: Beginning Latin for Homeschoolers and Self-Taught Students of Any Age by William E. Linney, and it's going well so far. E. (almost 6) struggled at first, but she is holding her own. The girls take turns translating the exercises each day, and we use the audio recordings to help with pronunciation. Even the twins have picked up a little bit. 

Shakespeare 

Our play this month was Macbeth. We read the children's version from Shakespeare Stories by Leon Garfield, and the girls started to memorize the "double, double toil and trouble" passage in parts. 

Read-Alouds 

We are doing two read-alouds at a time this year. Dad reads a historical fiction novel and I read an additional novel. September's books were Attar of the Ice Valley by Leonard Wibberley, The Axe of Bronze by Kurt Schmeltzer, The Crystal Tree by Jennie D. Lindquist, and Rabbit Hill by Robert Lawson (which we finished on St. Francis's feast day owing to his role in the end of the book.) 

Catechism

M. and C. memorized the answers to the questions in Lesson 1 of the New St. Joseph Baltimore Catechism Volume 1 and E. memorized the answers to the questions in the first few lessons of The St. Joseph First Communion Catechism. 

Science 

C. and E. are having science with me every morning before breakfast. We're reading The Golden Treasury of Natural History, and we have covered the formation of rocks, early animals (such as trilobites), and creatures of the seashore (including mollusks). 

M. and I read two chapters from Secrets of the Universe: "What is a natural law?" and "Archimedes' Principle." She watched a Demonstrations in Physics video with Julius Sumner Miller and did two experiments from Janice VanCleave's Physics for Every Kid, one about electricity and one about magnets. 

Health

E. watched the KidsHealth How the Body Works videos about the ear, nose, eye, and teeth. M. read some of the later chapters in The Body Book for Girls (she's almost done) and C. started reading it. C. and M. also both had orthdontist visits. 

History 

E. and I read the first four chapters in A Child's History of the World by V.M. Hillyer. We also read They Lived Like This in the Old Stone Age by Marie Neurath and The First Farmers by Leonard Weisgard, and she created some cave art with crayons on brown paper. 

M. and I read all but the final 5 chapters in The Early Human World. She wrote a narration about archaeologist Mary Leakey. She also watched supplemental videos: 

• Science Odyssey: Origins 1
• First Peoples - Africa
• Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life
• Becoming Human Episode 1
• Science Odyssey: Origins 2
• Dr. Leakey and the Dawn of Man
• Life on Earth Episode 13
• Becoming Human Episode 2
• First Peoples - Europe
• Becoming Human Episode 3
• Neanderthals: Meet Your Ancestors 
• Lapedo Child 
• First Peoples - Australia
• Cave of Forgotten Dreams
• Lascaux: How to Save 18,000 Years of History
• Ice Age Art
• First Peoples - America
• Prehistoric Animals of the Tar Pits

C. and Dad are reading The World of Captain John Smith by Genevieve Foster. They have covered these sections: The Queen's Little Pirate; Queen Elizabeth; Philip II; A Declaration of Independence; The Virgin Queen and Her Frog Prince; Mary Stuart; The Three Henrys and the Queen Mother of France; Young Walter Raleigh and Virginia; No Gold - But Tobacco; Little John Smith; To and From Holland; Mary Stuart and the Honest Man; James; Lord Roanoke and Virginia Dare; Spanish Armada; War of the Three Henrys; The Lost Colony; John Smith, Schoolboy; The Faerie Queen; The Upstart Crow (Shakespeare); The White-Plumed Henry (of Navarre); El Greco and Philip II; John Smith, Would-Be Knight; El Dorado, City of Gold; Akbar of India; Mr. Pilot in Japan; Entrance to China; Sun, Moon, and Stars; A Star Gazer, Tycho Brahe and His Dog; Gustav Adolf, Star of the North. 

Independently, C. read The Lost Colony and she wrote a narration about Roanoke as well. 

English 

M. worked on Vocabulary from Classical Roots A. C. started working in the Beginning book of Sentence Diagramming. E. did the first three chapters of Grammarland and the corresponding worksheets. 

All three girls read independently pretty much every day.

Math

M. continued working on Challenging Word Problems 3 and started doing the reviews in Singapore Primary Mathematics 5A. She is also working on Life of Fred: Decimals and Percents and she drills math facts with flashcards online every Friday. 

C. is working on Singapore Primary Mathematics 3B and Life of Fred: Farming, and she also does flashcards online. 

E. is working on Singapore Primary Mathematics 1A as well as Khan Academy Early Math.

M. and C. also continue to work on Khan Academy.

Music

All three girls practiced piano and recorder daily. 

Physical Education

The girls rode bikes many afternoons and played on the playground across from our house. 

Homeschool Plans: 2023-2024

This school year will be my fifth official year of homeschooling, and I will have three students - M., C., and E. Because these three girls have fall birthdays, they all did a year of kindergarten the year they turned five, so while the state of Maryland classifies them as 4th grade, 2nd grade, and kindergarten, we think of them as being in 5th, 3rd, and 1st, and they work at all different levels in all different subjects. 

Social Studies 

M. has completed the first phrase of the trivium, so she will be doing the Ancients at the logic level this year. E. will be doing the same time period at the grammar level. 

M. will be reading The World in Ancient Times textbook series, including the volume of primary documents, and we will discuss the material and supplement with related video series, including Between the Rivers, History of Ancient Egypt, History of India, From Yao to Mao, Ancient Greek Civilization, History of Ancient Rome, Maya to Aztec and Lost Worlds of South America. 

With E., I will be reading aloud A Child's History of the World by V.M. Hillyer and supplementing with  most of the same picture books and videos M. and C. read their first year.

C. is in year three of the grammar stage, and she will be studying the Late Renaissance and Early Modern periods with Daddy using books by Genevieve Foster and the same videos and supplemental reading M. used two years ago. 

Together, all three girls will learn about important geographical and architectural landmarks from The Book of Marvels. 

Science

We designed our own physics curriculum for Meg with Secrets of the Universe by Paul Fleisher as her spine. She will be watching video demonstrations starring Julius Sumner Miller and simulations from PhET at the University of Colorado, and doing experiments independently using Janice VanCleave's Physics for Every Kid. 

Though we are still technically using Building Foundations for Scientific Understanding as our science curriculum for C. and E., I wanted a change, so we chose The Golden Treasury of Natural History as our spine for learning about our main subjects of plants and animals. At the end of the year, we will do a quick unit on magnetism to finish out the two-year course we've been on. 

English

M. will continue her work with Rex Barks, as well as with Vocabulary from Classical Roots. She will also be writing narrations to accompany her history, with the goal of learning to identify and communicate the main ideas of the chapters she reads. 

C. will begin sentence diagramming this year. She will also do some narrations.

E. will work through Grammarland by listening to the lessons and completing the worksheets for each one. She will work on narrating her history and science lessons. 

Additionally, we will have daily read-alouds. The plan is to have one historical fiction and one realistic or fantasy title going at all times. We will also read one Shakespeare play per month and do a weekly poetry lesson from Poem Making by Myra Cohn Livingston. 

Latin 

All three girls will begin Latin together this year. We'll be using Getting Started with Latin. We will also continue to memorize prayers and psalms in Latin and to attend the Latin Mass once a month. 

Math 

The girls kept up with math all summer, so everyone is already well into their work for this year. 

M. is doing algebra on Khan Academy and will be doing the review sections of Singapore Primary Mathematics 5A. 

C. is working on third grade math on Khan Academy and Singapore 3B. 

E. is working on Early Math on Khan Academy and will be working on Singapore 1A. 

M. will move into Life of Fred: Decimals and C. will begin Life of Fred: Farming. M. and C. will continue to drill math facts using online flashcards, but we will be reducing the frequency from daily to weekly. 

Religion 

E. will begin her two-year preparation for First Communion using The St. Joseph First Communion Catechism. M. and C. who have received First Communion, will move into the New St. Joseph Baltimore Catechism Volume 1, and we will take that at whatever pace they can manage it. 

Health

M. will be finishing The Body Book for Girls, and C. will begin to read it. 

E. will study human body systems using the resources from Kids Health. 

Art 

This year, art will mainly be covered by the material in The Book of Marvels, but the girls will also create art using how-to-draw videos, craft kits, and various media. 

Music

All three girls will continue playing piano and recorder and learning to sing. E. is using the Denes Agay Primer and Hands on Recorder, C. is using Denes Agay Book 2, 50 Graded Studies for Recorder, and Recorder Time, and M. is using Denes Agay Book 3 and The Recorder Guide.

Music appreciation will most likely include a mix of ballet, opera, and musicals.

Physical Education 

We got a good jump-start on PE with all three girls practicing their swimming at the pool this summer. They will continue to ride bikes and play on the playground, and hopefully they will get a chance to practice more with their basketball. We may also reintroduce the morning warm-up exercises they did a few years back. 

Preschool 

R. and A. are three and a half, so this year is preschool for them. We will be doing some good read-alouds and making sure to review their letters and numbers. I expect their learning to pick up a lot more in the second half of the year, as they are still quite young compared to their sisters when they were starting preschool.